Child maltreatment and marijuana problems in young adults: Examining the role of motives and emotion dysregulation

It is well established that childhood maltreatment is an important predictor of marijuana use, but few studies have examined the mechanisms underlying this relationship. The current study examines marijuana motives as mediators of the relationship between childhood maltreatment and marijuana use in a sample of young adults. In addition, pathways from childhood maltreatment to emotion dysregulation, coping motives, and marijuana use were explored. Participants were 125 young adults (ages 19–25, 66.9% female) recruited through online community advertising. All participants completed questionnaires assessing childhood maltreatment, emotion dysregulation, marijuana motives, past year and past three-month marijuana use, and marijuana problems. Correlational analyses revealed bivariate relationships between childhood maltreatment, emotion dysregulation, marijuana motives and marijuana problems (rs = .24–.50). Mediation analyses revealed that coping motives mediated the relationship between childhood maltreatment and marijuana problems, and emotion dysregulation was associated with marijuana problems both directly and indirectly via coping motives. The present findings highlight emotion dysregulation and coping motives as important underlying mechanisms in the relationship between childhood maltreatment and marijuana problems.